


Somewhere Between Heaven and Hell

by iamtheoneinthehole



Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Angels & Demons
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-31
Updated: 2014-03-31
Packaged: 2018-01-17 18:15:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,259
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1397707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iamtheoneinthehole/pseuds/iamtheoneinthehole
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>From madcowedgar’s prompt graveyard; endragh asked you: ah OT6: an angel/demon story where half of them are angels and half of them are demons. maybe how they met and fell in love?</p>
<p>It’d all started out when they’d been given the orders to ‘take care’ of three of the ringleaders responsible for the recent surge in demonic activity...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Somewhere Between Heaven and Hell

**Author's Note:**

> When I saw this in the prompt graveyard, I couldn’t quite resist trying my hand at writing it, I hope if you see this endragh that you like what I’ve done with it! (Also I may have taken some liberties with this prompt since one of the ‘demons’ is, technically, a fallen angel… hope you don’t mind!). Enjoy!

It’d all started out when they’d been given the orders to ‘take care’ of three of the ringleaders responsible for the recent surge in demonic activity.

It wasn’t exactly an unusual order to receive. In fact, most of the orders Geoff received from the higher ups these days were these ones, and the frequency that the orders were given seemed to be constantly on the increase as the levels demonic activity in the world suddenly began to surge. And it was almost painfully obvious, to anyone paying any real attention to what was going on. The demons had gotten themselves a new leader, someone powerful enough to keep the others in line and with enough charisma to make them willingly follow him. Geoff knew it, his garrison knew it, all the angels did. It was an unspoken fear they all shared, though no one dared to voice it, as if remaining silent on the matter would somehow make it go away. But it wasn’t going away anytime soon and even the higher ups were starting to panic. After all, their kind had remained relatively unchallenged on the field of battle for so long now, they’d almost forgotten what it was to take part in a  _real_  war.

Geoff hadn’t though. How could he when he’d been there on the front lines of the last one? When the morning star had risen and fallen, leaving the heavens in a bleak sort of devastation in the aftermath. He could remember it as clearly as any of those who’d been there, could still clearly picture the chaos behind closed eyelids, the screaming and the avowed vengeance that’d been sworn upon all those who were present before the archangel had finally fallen.

What made the memory all the more poignant for Geoff, however, was the way it’d been mirrored a few centuries later as another of their own had openly defied the heavens, meeting the same inevitable fate and falling, just the arch had before him. And that particular fall Geoff could remember, clear as day, clearer perhaps than any other that’d been present at the time because… Ryan had been his friend, perhaps even bordering on more than that.

He’d been a powerful angel once, beautiful, majestic even… and his radiance had almost been blinding to Geoff because where most angels simply gave off a faint glow, Ryan had burned, fierce and absolute and almost as bright as the morningstar himself had been. Perhaps then, the signs had always been there that he’d followed in the arch’s footsteps one day. But he’d been enthusiastic, intelligent, capable, good humored… and the way he presented himself to the host, to Geoff, just seemed to inspire a sort of confidence in the man, in what he did, in what he said.

Even as a young fledgling, when he’d first been assigned to Geoff (just after the higher ups had granted him the responsibility of looking after the young angel), he’d had a certain way of seeing right through Geoff; past the layers of skin and feathers and bone into his very soul… And it’d been that, perhaps, that’d been the reason Ryan had ultimately managed to have Geoff and about half the rest of garrison he belonged to wrapped around his little finger, even before he’d first learned to fly…

And as he’d grown older, he’d become a respected warrior on the battlefield, and an admired potential mate by his many suitors who’d constantly tried to catch the angel’s attention, though to little effect since Ryan had only ever seemed to have eyes for Geoff… And Geoff could never be entirely sure whether that fixation the angel had for him was romantic in nature or simply a platonic bond but… all the same, he’d taken a great sort of satisfaction in staring down any angel that dared to get a little too close to Ryan, the unspoken ‘ _back the fuck off_ ’ clearly evident in his gaze and, most of the time, it’d worked pretty damn well at making his potential suitors keep their distance.

Ryan had never really seemed to notice those interactions though, or perhaps he had but had simply never commented on it, Geoff hadn’t really cared. What’d mattered to him was the fact that he got to spend almost all of his days in the angel’s presence and, because of that, everything back then had been fucking  _perfect_ …

But then Ryan had started to question things. Their orders, the pecking order of heaven, the way they were forced to pledge their unwavering loyalty to a, mostly, absent leader… He’d questioned all of it… and, before long, he’d begun to fight it.

It was little things at first. The occasional loophole in an order that the man would exploit, little trivial things that hardly mattered, except they did because they were orders but… Ryan had made it all sound so rational, so appealing, and Geoff found himself following the man down for a while into his disobedient downward spiral, the two of them flitting about the heavens and leaving no small amount of chaos in their wake…

But then Geoff had been assigned Jack, a young fledgling who’d needed a responsible role model and, apparently, Geoff had made the cut… and suddenly he’d felt that he couldn’t be quite so free and liberal with his ideals, couldn’t disobey quite so many orders when he had to ensure that Jack’s upbringing was a solid and whole one.

At first he’d thought Ryan would understand that. But the angel had instead seemed enthused by the idea of bringing Jack up to adopt their ways, to think outside of the box like they did… and, as usual, his words had been so convincing that he’d almost wanted to agree, to raise Jack like that, to let him learn the tricks of their trade, consequences be damned, but… then he’d felt the fledgling tug on his sleeve and he’d turned to meet the gaze of the young man now within his care… and he’d known that this was the one thing he couldn’t grant Ryan. He couldn’t grant him Jack’s corruption, even if he could grant him his, because the little fledgling deserved better than to be steered onto this path so early before he’d really had a chance to make any decisions for himself…

To say Ryan hadn’t taken it well would’ve been a serious fucking understatement.

He’d felt ‘betrayed’, claiming that he’d trusted Geoff to stand by him and that he’d believed the bond they shared was stronger than any sense of ‘moral duty’ to their corrupted supervisors… and the words had hurt, burned even, as the angel had all but  _screamed_ at him but Geoff had forced himself to maintain his resolve and eventually, Ryan had seemed to give up.

Not on his beliefs though… on Geoff.

And Geoff hadn’t even fucking noticed at first, far too busy at the time with raising Jack. Teaching the fledgling to talk, making sure he was constantly surrounded by love and protection in his formative stages, teaching the man how to fly when he was ready, the way he’d taught Ryan before him…

He hadn’t noticed until it was too fucking late and Ryan was on trial in heaven’s courts for ‘disobedience’ which he readily admitted to with a ‘devil may care’ smile and a fire in his eyes that’d honestly frightened even Geoff a little since it reminded him so much of the way the legendary ‘morningstar’ was always described in the stories about his own trial… and as it’d turned out, that mental comparison between the two had turned out to be pretty fucking apt given that, moments later, the angel’s fate was bound to the same fate the archangel had suffered before him, one of the most inhumane and unforgiving punishments there was…

Because Ryan had been sentenced to  _fall_.

The only thing that’d stopped Geoff from intervening was the knowledge that there was no saving Ryan from this, not now, not when he wouldn’t even pretend to feel remorse for what he’d done… There was nothing he could do to stop Ryan from falling and the fledgling currently burrowed into his side, looking on with wide sad eyes as a defiant Ryan was lead towards heavens gates, was a solid reminder at his side of why he couldn’t even dare to risk an attempt to save him anyway. Jack needed him and, as much as it  _fucking tore him apart_ not to intervene, or make sure at least Ryan knew he still gave a damn about him, that he wasn’t alone in all this… he couldn’t. He had to hold his tongue. For Jack’s sake.

And so Ryan had fallen and had fallen alone and Geoff hadn’t heard much about Ryan after that. He almost suspected the higher ups were trying to block any news of the fallen angel from reaching his ears, just to make sure he didn’t try to do anything fucking stupid, like aid the man… and honestly, he couldn’t blame them. Especially when a part of him still regretted the fact that he hadn’t been able to follow Ryan in his defiance, in his fall… And so years had passed with barely a word, or even a whisper, of his name beyond heaven’s pearly white gates.

Jack had grown up and had even been given his own fledgling to raise by this point, a young and fairly adventurous angel named Ray who’d certainly grown into his abilities far faster than either of them had anticipated. In fact, the man almost put them to shame by this point, despite the fact that they both had centuries of experience on the younger angel… Neither of them minded too much though because they were both too busy really being so fuckin proud of Ray’s progress. Geoff had no doubt in his mind that, someday, the younger angel would lead a garrison of his own, one far more skilled and precise than Geoff’s, and that when that time came, they couldn’t want for a better or more capable leader. And with time, and between the comforting presences of Jack and Ray in his life, Geoff had managed to find a family in these two… and while it still fucking hurt to even think about thinking about Ryan sometimes, most days he was able to put the whole goddamn clusterfuck of a situation behind him and move on…

But then he’d been given the orders to find and kill Ryan and his two most loyal demons and suddenly any hopes of moving on with his existence came crashing down around him.

He didn’t want to do it… He’d never wanted to disobey more. But orders were orders and if his were to track down Ryan, and his inner circle, interrogate them about their plans and then smite them to dust? Well that was what he had to do. Oh course he didn’t fucking want to, he’d never wanted to do anything less, to not only end up on opposite sides of the war from the man he’d once trusted with everything and had honestly believed would be his mate one day but… to actually be the one to drive that blade through his heart. But what other fucking choice did he have? He had his orders, just like Jack and Ray had theirs, and he had to adhere to them and to set a good example to his makeshift family. It was what was expected of their kind, what would stop them from falling as Ryan had, what was  _right_ … But that still didn’t mean he had to fucking like it.

And he knew Jack was no more fond of the idea than he was, though perhaps for slightly less specific reasons than Geoff’s. Of course, unlike Ray, Jack had the basic memories of Ryan, and he knew that the angel had played a more than significant role in Geoff’s earlier existence but… For Jack, the issue lay more with the pure and honest heart that happened to reside within his chest, purer than any other Geoff had ever laid eyes upon. Jack had always been the very essence of kindness and humility and, very likely, even the muse that’d spawned so many inaccurate interpretations of their kind. The ones with the fluffy wings and wide cherubic smiles, that floated around singing songs of love, instead of fighting in constant, bloody, brutal wars… Not to say that Jack wasn’t a capable warrior. He’d never have been assigned to Geoff’s garrison when he came of age if he hadn’t been at least slightly capable with a weapon, even with his already existing strong connections to Geoff based around his upbringing… It was just that he didn’t particularly bear too much love to the orders they were given. Which was certainly a refreshing perspective to have when you lived your life surrounded by those who would practically get off on the adrenaline kick of war.

And it was often, wrongly, assumed that Ray was one of those soldiers, given the extraordinary proficiency the man had always shown in battle, to the point where he’d ended up as a part of Geoff’s garrison a good two years before he’d actually been of age, simply because he’d shown such ‘promise’. And if you were fighting by the angel’s side in battle, you’d be given even more reason to assume Ray enjoyed what he did given the wide grin he’d wear and the snarky remarks he’d used to taunt his opponents but… Geoff knew it was all an act he put on, something to overcompensate for the fact that even he didn’t take pleasure in what they did. Not anymore. Sure, it’d been a game to the man at first, just like was to most fledglings at first… But then Ray had started to notice that not everything in the war, between their forces and the demons they fought, was quite as black and white as their superiors often made it out to be… and sometimes it scared Geoff how close the angel seemed to be to straying towards the thoughts that’d caused Ryan to fall but… he never dared voice those beliefs, not wanting to draw attention to the man’s doubts and cause another of those he cared about to fall because of him.

Because if Ryan’s fall had taught Geoff and his garrison anything, it was that you didn’t question yours orders… not openly anyway. You grit your teeth and fucking got on with it, no matter how tough it got or how vehemently you disagreed with the job you’d been assigned. You kept it to yourself, got the job done and kept you goddamn mouth shut… or you’d fall, just like he had.

——

Geoff supposed he should have known that Ryan would be expecting them. The former angel had always been pretty damn sharp when he wanted to be and Geoff’s garrison weren’t exactly renowned for their subtlety…But then again, neither were Ryan’s newest and, apparently, infamous companions.

Which was something that’d honestly surprised Geoff a little when he’d first found out, especially given the way that Ryan had always seemed to stray towards partners in crime that had a certain knack for subtly up until this point, allowing him to slip comfortably below the higher up’s radar as a result. He’d never quite managed to fully evade Geoff’s, but that was just because he’d known the man so well before the fall (or perhaps, as Geoff liked to think during his more self-indulgent moments, because Ryan didn’t truly want to). But even then, he’d only ever caught snatches of what Ryan was up to. He’d certainly had nothing substantial to go on until this point.

And as far as the other angels had been concerned, Geoff’s former protegee had, essentially, dropped off the map when he’d fallen and the first most of them had actually heard of the fallen angel since then was when his name started to get tossed around upstairs alongside the names ‘Michael’ and ‘Gavin’.

Michael’s name was one with which most of them had already been almost painfully familiar. The infamous ‘Mogar’, a demon that’d been born out of a deal made on the battlefield when the former warrior had bargained his soul for unnatural, inhuman, capability with a sword… and, apparently, he’d been granted it in tenfold. Some people claimed it was because the demon he’d made the deal with had been sweet on him… but since most of the host were taught to believe demons incapable of such emotions, Geoff was never really sure how much stock to place in those stories.

And after the deal had been settled upon, Mogar had gone on to become a mighty warrior, his name still living on in many of the legends humans would whisper to each other in awed, hushed voices around a campfire. He’d slaughtered hundreds, wounded even more, and many were certain that the world would never quite recover from the mark this man had left on its surface…

Then the time had come for the demon the man had dealt with to collect his payment and the human version of Michael was no more…

It’d taken a couple of centuries for his name to make itself known again but when it had, it’d been with fire, chaos and the body count of thousands in his wake. Apparently his immense skill had more than carried through to his demonic incarnation, along with his bloodlust which had also seemed to increase itself tenfold. Before long, he’d been earmarked as a ‘serious threat’. and one that needed to be ‘dealt with’ as soon as possible.

It’d appeared for a while that Michael might even have been raising an army to wage war against the garrisons given the way that demons seemed to flock to the man, like a moth to a untempered flame… But, as time passed, it became growingly apparent that Michael had absolutely no interest in working with others. He worked efficiently, he worked ruthlessly, he worked  _alone_ … the trail of demonic corpses, as long as the trail of human ones, which he always seemed to leave in his wake proved as much.

And because he conveniently eradicated so many of the other demons that’d been causing the higher ups concern, they’d ended up choosing to turn a blind eye to the demon’s actions. After all, the demon was a capable warrior, but if he continued to turn on his own like this he was bound to wind up dead sooner or later without them even having to lift a finger…

They hadn’t counted on him finding an exception to his hard set rules.

Which had, ultimately, been where Gavin had come into the picture. A young, up and coming demon who’d only been around for the last half a century or so but who’d shown an alarming amount of potential in that short amount of time… The strange thing was, he’d been one of those rare demons who hadn’t sold his soul for selfish reasons… It’d been to save the life of his best friend, a man called Dan who’d been enlisted in the army at the time and who Gavin had been utterly convinced would never return from the frontlines without a little help.

And so he’s struck a deal with Michael to keep the man safe and, when the time had come (a little later than it did for most… and perhaps the higher ups weren’t entirely accurate in their claims that demons were incapable of feeling emotion if older demon was so willing to make these exceptions for the younger one), Gavin had accepted his fate readily enough. Some even claimed he’d greeted Michael, and the death that followed inevitably in his wake, with a smile…

It hadn’t been long after that when the stories of this new demon’s exploits had started to reach Geoff’s garrison, stories of carnage and brutality as the younger demon was trained under Michael’s expert hand. The older demon still mostly worked alone, but it seemed he’d made an exception for Gavin and Geoff knew the higher ups had been antsy about it at the time, even as they’d decided to continue their policy of neutrality towards him for now, because what if it happened again and, regardless of their former beliefs, the demon  _did_ end up forming an army…

And when Ryan’s name had started to crop up alongside the pair of demons’, it was a surprise to roughly no one when the higher ups had finally snapped and given the orders to take them out…

He supposed Ryan must’ve known his actions would draw attention, must’ve known the orders would be given and Geoff, because it was always going to be Geoff who got that order. The higher ups could have a really fucking twisted sense of humour when they wanted to… Plus, he was pretty damn sure this was their way of testing were his true loyalties lay (since he was pretty sure they still all believed that, if it hadn’t been for his responsibilities with Jack, he’d have fallen with Ryan… and honestly, they may not have been entirely wrong in that belief).

All the same though, the fact that the former angel had actually been sat there waiting for him, Jack and Ray to arrive, a light smile curling his lips that spoke nothing of the more malicious intent dancing in his gaze, had thrown Geoff a little. And the presence of Gavin and Michael on either side of him, lips pulled up into almost identical grins, that were just a little too gleeful about the prospect of the inevitable battle here, wasn’t exactly helping with his feelings of unease either.

Geoff had forced himself to keep his cool, however, knowing both Ray and Jack were counting on him to take the lead in this. After all, he was the only one of them who’d really known Ryan before the fall, had really bothered to fully understand him,  so if anyone would be able to successfully predict the man’s actions, it’d be him (or at least that was what they believed… and Geoff honestly hadn’t had the heart to tell his boys that no one had ever really been able to predict the man’s actions before he carried them out, even before he’d fallen).

There was a long beat of silence as Geoff did a quick skim of the perimeter for civilians, his gaze then finally locking on the fallen angel in front of him, “Ryan.”

“Long time no see Geoff… still heaven’s good little toy soldier I see.”

“This coming from hell’s little bitch.” Ryan’s lips curled a little wider at that, his amused laughter echoing across the abandoned stone courtyard they were gathered in right now.

“Touche. I’m glad to see at least that they haven’t managed to kill your spirit.”

“Well there aren’t any rules against-”

“Really? As far as I remember, there were rules against practically  _everything_ upstairs, and once upon a time we broke them all.” And suddenly Ray and Jack’s eyes were on him, the younger angel wide-eyed and obviously shocked by the revelation whereas the elder was simply levelling Geoff with a gaze that clearly asked if he was sure he’d be able to follow through with this, because Jack wouldn’t exactly judge him if he backed out here and now… And Geoff had found himself grateful for that, even as he’d waved the man’s offer off, as well as a little guilty about not giving Ray the full story before they’d headed out to face Ryan and his followers. He’d carefully kept both reactions from his features however, not wanting to give the fallen angel the satisfaction of knowing he was getting to him, even a little bit.

“That was different and you fucking know it.”

“You’re right, it was… Because that was before you decided to sell yourself out to the higher ups. That was before you sat back and watched me fall and did _nothing_.” And suddenly the humor was gone from Ryan’s eyes, something darker replacing it as the man had wandered over to Geoff, an amused chuckle escaping his lips as he caught sight of the way Jack started forward, almost instinctively, from where he stood, as if he were planning to intervene, “Isn’t that sweet. I’m guessing this is the fledgling you took in shortly before I fell?” And suddenly the former angel’s scrutiny had shifted to Jack as he eyed the man assessingly, a slight smirk coming to his lips moments later as he moved closer to the man, “Well didn’t  _you_ grow up in all the right places…”

“Leave him alone asshole.”

“Why? He’s a big boy now isn’t he? He can take care of himself, isn’t that right _Jack_ ,” Something about the way the name rolled off Ryan’s tongue made it sound more as if he was purring it that anything and he could see the man in question hadn’t been entirely unaffected by that given the light flush in the man’s cheeks, even as his gaze and his grip on the blade at his side both remained steady as ever, “Tell me, are the orders about which blunt object you boys have to stick in me all that specific? Because if not, I believe we can find another, more pleasing,  _arrangement_  to resolve this matter, on both sides. I’m sure Geoff’s told you after all, I’m an expert in finding loopholes in the higher up’s rule book.”

“You were until you fucked up and got caught.”

“Ever loyal to the story Geoff tells you I see…  _cute_. But really, who ever said that I didn’t want to be caught?” Geoff knew the shock at the man’s words had shown a little in his expression when a few moments later Ryan’s lips had curled into a grin and, suddenly, the man’s attention was back on him and, thankfully, away from Jack who’d been starting to look a little hot under the collar under the fallen angel’s intense scrutiny, “You really didn’t realize did you Geoff? How far I’d fallen before I even fell… I found some of  _his_ old scrolls and they made sense, more sense than any of the orders we were given ever had… so I knew I had to fall, to meet him, to forge a new path.”

“A path that involves the slaughtering of hundreds of innocents-”

“Angel’s cut down human and demon alike in their  _thousands_. It was what we were created to do wasn’t it? Wage war, kill, destroy. No matter what we do we’re all soldiers in the end Geoff. I’ve simply decided to fight for a worthier cause.”

“And he’s right you know,” The red headed demon, Michael, added after a few moments, wandering over to meet Geoff’s gaze as he continued, “Angels come down here all the time to smite us, and when they do they really don’t fucking discriminate. Men, women, children, innocents… ‘collateral damage’. Even we’re not  _that_ cold. If we kill something, we kill it. For vengeance, for love, for fun, because it is fucking fun, but… at least we never try to pass it off as fucking ‘ _just_ ’ or ‘ _necessary_ ’ or ‘ _collateral fucking damage_ ’. We’re much more honest about the monsters we are than you self-righteous assholes ever seem to be… And you know things upstairs are fucked up when a demon who’s slaughtered thousands of innocents can actually take the fucking moral high ground on something like this.”

“Ryan seemed content enough to blame ‘collateral fucking damage’ before he fell.”

“Ryan  _seemed_ content enough to do a lot of things before he fell… but he still fell and I don’t know about you, but to me that strikes me as someone who wasn’t quite so fucking content with the way things were as he seemed, and decided to change that, by any means possible.”

“So his grand plan for that was to fall and… what? Become best pals with the fucking morningstar?”

“I wouldn’t necessarily calls us ‘pals’. We talked, yes, extensively in fact and he seemed pleased to see one of his own following the path he’d set out for all of us, enough so that he set me up as his regent in fact, until of course the seals on his cage break and he’s allowed to return to his throne once more.”

“…Wait so the higher ups were actually right when they talked about him-” Ray finally cut in, clearly having silently assessed their opponents enough to feel confident he could match them when the inevitable physical battle broke out, for now choosing to occupy himself by entering the verbal fray.

“Taking over hell’s armies and launching an all out assault on their precious pearly white gates? Not quite. My endgame happens to be just a little bit more complex than that.”

“Do you always have talk in fucking riddles.”

“Only when I’m certain it’ll frustrate those I’m talking to… you were Jack’s fledgling right? The young fledgling with the impeccable aim oh yes, I’ve heard quite a bit about you. I always like to keep tabs, after all, on any angels that are starting to have doubts.”

“…What makes you think I have any?”

“Your hesitation just then was a pretty big hint.”

“Fuck you.”

“You really should be careful who you say those words around Ray, someone might take them as an invitation.” And Geoff didn’t missing the way the air seemed to catch in the younger angel’s throat a little at Ryan’s words, no more than he’d missed the way that the second demon, the one that hadn’t spoken yet, and how he now seemed to be eyeing Geoff with something that bordered on an inquisitive sort of fascination.

“If you’ve got a question, may as well fucking ask it.” Geoff finally offered towards the demon, honestly beginning to feel a little weirded out by the man’s intent and silent observation of him.

“Ryan’s always told us you were a fully grown angel while he was still a fledgling, and he’s about two whole millennia old now… how old does that make you?”

“Older than I’m going to admit to a half-a-century year old demon.”

“You’ve been keeping tabs on us too then?” Ryan seemed almost pleased by the knowledge which, honestly, surprised Geoff a little since the former angel had always seemed to hate it when people invaded his privacy… but perhaps he’d been intending for Geoff to do so. Perhaps that was why he’d teamed up with Michael and Gavin, to reel him in… Or perhaps it was for some other, far less self-centered reason than the one his mind had just come up with.

“Its in my orders to keep them on potential threats to heaven and the higher ups-”

“Then tell me Geoff, why was it that they had to bring the news of our potential threat to you and not the other way around?”

“…I guess I just held a misplaced sense of hope that you’d come to your fucking senses before they gave me orders I couldn’t find the loophole in.” The smirk had seemed to slip a little from Ryan’s expression at that as he’d offered Geoff a sad, and almost genuine, smile.

“I suppose there’s no room for maneuvering within those in the orders you have now hmm?”

“None. They were very precise about exactly what they wanted.”

“And of course you’ll follow the orders they gave you, like the good little soldier you are… I suppose we should probably get this over with then.”

There’d been a small beat of silence, as Geoff’s hand had shifted to unsheath his blade, and then suddenly they were fighting, blades whirling in a mess of bright flashes of metal and light smatterings of crimson across the cobblestone surrounding them whenever one of them managed to land a hit. He could just about catch sight, out of the corner of his vision, of Ray matching Michael blow for blow, and never had he been more fucking grateful for the angel’s ‘raw talent’ when it came to situations like this because Michael was matching his every strike, the legends clearly not boasting falsely of the man’s prowess in battle.

He couldn’t see Jack and Gavin though and while it concerned him not to have a direct visual on the older angel, he knew he didn’t have time to be concerned about him right now, not when Ryan was circling him with something dark and predatory twisting and shifting behind his gaze… And it honestly hurt to meet that stare because, looking into the man’s eyes, he could clearly see that the once innocent fledgling he’d raised was gone, something more sinister and malicious having taken its place and suddenly Geoff found himself understanding exactly what the morningstar himself had seen in this man. Because if Geoff hadn’t been too preoccupied by his feelings of hurt, he’d probably be terrified right now…

He forced himself to hold the man’s gaze regardless though, knowing that looking away would be proof of a weakness he really didn’t want to give the fallen angel a chance to exploit. And so they maintained the eye contact for a good few minutes as they circled each other, Ryan finally breaking the tension with his first, well aimed, blow to Geoff’s wings, a few bloodied feathers dropping to the floor for the man’s efforts.

But Geoff had paid the slight pain coursing through the shaven part of his wings little heed, instead focusing his efforts on sufficiently wounding Ryan’s blade arm, making it that much harder for the former angel to lash out at him as a result.

It’d continued like that for a while, the two of them circling each other for a while before one of them would lash out, the other retaliating moments later until a mess of both of their feathers littered the floor, both of them out of breath and bleeding profusely when Geoff had finally managed to disarm Ryan of his blade.

He’d stood there over him for a few moments, catching his breath and the other battles continued to go on around them and Ryan eyed him with a cold sort of questioning look before his gaze flicked back to the blade now resting along the arch of his neck, “What are you waiting for Geoff? A redaction of orders? Some kind of miracle? For me to magically change my stance on things so that everything can go back to the way it was before? Because its not going to happen… so you may as well kill me because if you don’t? You can be damned sure one of the cowards who sent you will send another one of their little toy soldiers to take you out or make you fall for disobedience…”

“Since when do you care if they did?”

“Caring was never the issue we shared Geoff… if anything, its one of the reasons I fell.”

“What the hell do you mean by that?”

“I mean that when I fell, I believed you’d fall with me.”

“Why?”

“Because I believed in those promises we made each other… and I believed in you,” And suddenly any lingering traces of desire Geoff had to follow his orders were gone and he could feel the blade slip from his fingers, thankfully not slicing Ryan’s neck in the process as it clattered to the floor.

“You realize if you don’t pick up that blade and finish the job, they’ll come for you.”

“I do.”

“They’ll come for your boys too since they know you care for both of them far more than you mean to. They’ll use that against you.”

“I know.”

“You’ll have to flee heaven, live on the run, under the radar. You may well wind up dead.”

“I realize that Ryan, I wasn’t fucking created yesterday.”

“Then why not fucking finish the job?”

“I can’t…”

At the sound of those two little words, something had softened in the fallen angel’s eyes, almost to the point where he resembled his former self, as one of his hands moved to gently cup Geoff’s cheek, “Then don’t,” And then Ryan’s lips had moved to capture his and it felt like selling his soul to the goddamned morningstar himself to kiss back but Geoff really couldn’t help it as one of his hands had tangled in the man’s shirt, using it to tug him closer as the other tangled in the fallen angel’s hair.

And for a long moment, the world had blurred into nothing more than the feeling of Ryan’s lips on his, his teeth nipping at Geoff’s lower lip, just hard enough to draw blood as the fallen angel’s tongue coaxing his into a battle for dominance that Geoff quickly lost. Yet, somehow, he couldn’t seem to bring himself to give a damn because he’d been holding back from giving into this for far too long and now the damage had already been done, he saw no real harm in letting the man know just how much of an influence he still held over him, that’d he’d always held from the moment they’d met and that Geoff, despite his best efforts since the fall, had never quite managed to shake.

Eventually they pulled back for air and suddenly Geoff became aware of the almost deafening sort of silence that’d fallen upon the men around them.

It’d been with an embarrassed sort of sheepishness that he’d turned to face Jack first, expecting to find some revulsion or, at the very least, disappointment in the man’s gaze… so he’d been surprised to say the least when he’d noted the way the man’s eyes seemed slightly darker than they’d been before… and, if Gavin’s smug looks towards a certain part of the man’s anatomy were anything to go by, the angel had actually had a pretty positive reaction to this turn of events.

After that, he’d turned to face Ray, jaw dropping a little when he noted the compromising position he seemed to be in with Michael who appeared to be pressing him into the wall with an amused looking smirk on his face and… well the younger angel didn’t seem in too much of a hurry to get away from the demon or that position anytime soon given the coy smile on his lips and the way he seemed to be tugging him in closer and…  _fuck_  that was hot.

He’d eventually managed to tear his attention away from the men, gaze briefly flickering back over to Gavin and Jack, the former of which now seemed to be trailing light, teasing kisses along the angel’s neck and Geoff could almost make out the man’s quiet moans from here and…

He turned his gaze back to Ryan, noting the smug smile now curving the corners of his lips with the slightest hint of disbelief as he spoke, “You were planning this the whole fucking time, weren’t you?”

“I wouldn’t necessarily say planning on it. Hoping for it perhaps, but you’re a pretty difficult man to predict and I had no idea your boys would be so  _receptive_ to this.”

“You and me both… so, where do we go from here?”

“If you’re regretting your choice not to kill me, the knife’s still sat there waiting for you. I’m sure the higher ups would happily forgive and forget if you brought them my head.”

“Fuck that.” Ryan’s lips had curved into a grin that was almost fond at that.

“That sounds more like the Geoff I used to know. I suppose you’re left with three options then. One, allow them to catch you, torture you and kill you. I’m not going to sugarcoat it, it’d be long, messy, drawn out and painful. They’d make you beg for death. Two, you and your boys can go on the run, trying to stay below the radar and, hopefully, succeeding at it… since if you don’t you revert back to option one and I’m pretty sure you’d rather avoid that particular fate… Or option three, you stay with me, Michael and Gavin and we teach you how freeing a life without a need for loopholes can really be.”

Geoff had pretended to deliberate over the options for a moment, for show’s sake, but they both already knew which choice he’d made from the moment he’d let that blade slip through his fingers. And really, as the fallen angel began to press closer, murmuring a ‘ _lesson one_ ’ into Geoff’s neck as he’d slid into his lap, rolling his hips down to meet Geoff’s and… oh.

Yeah, at the end of the day, option three really didn’t sound so bad.

——

Of course option three wasn’t without its hitches.

Allying with Ryan had made Geoff, and his two fellow newly fallen angels, a lot of powerful enemies and it was rare that a day passed without one of those enemies making some kind of attempt on one of their lives… Of course when they did they found themselves faced with a demon warrior who was quite literally the stuff of legends, another demon whose skills had accelerated enough in the space of a mere half century to make himself a name that the higher ups feared, a fallen angel who’d once shown more promise than any other angel in the garrison, the morningstar’s self-proclaimed regent, a man whose usual soft-hearted nature turned to stone the moment someone threatened one of his own and Geoff who, despite his obvious sympathies for Ryan when he’d originally fallen, had been kept on in the host for a fucking good reason; because none of the higher ups had wanted to cross him.

In short, the would be assassins they’d send after Geoff and his boys were always woefully underprepared by the time they came face to face with the men they’d been ordered to ‘take care of’… and none of them ever live long enough to report that back to their bosses. And that outlet for the demon’s and Ryan’s bloodlust had allowed him, Jack and Ray to, little by little, wean the boys off some of their more innocent victims. Because the angels they kept spending after them meant that their avaliable victims were never exactly in short supply, and as far as Geoff was concerned, these were the kind of men who actually had it coming when one of the boys would grab a knife from their makeshift rack and begin to slice.

Other than that though, things between the group seemed to, mostly, go off without a hitch. Their fights were short and easily resolved, the issues of morality they’d initially had were mostly negotiated out and accepted by this point and, as time passed, they’d all become experts at slipping under the radar of anyone who posed them any real, serious threat.

In short, life was pretty fucking great (and Geoff was sure that the pretty great fucking played a fairly significant role in that) and whenever he’d catch Ryan’s eye, during one of those rare quiet moments where they weren’t running or fighting or fucking, he’d know the man felt the same way. Because somehow, amidst the taboos and the bent and broken rules, they’d managed to establish something special here, precious… and Geoff honestly wasn’t sure if he was ready to call that love yet, but he knew it was pretty damn close.


End file.
